Teacher waivers decline in Worcester

Jacqueline Reis TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

Published Sunday April 7, 2013 at 6:00 am

Updated Sunday April 7, 2013 at 9:18 am

In April 2009, the School Department was preparing to dismiss up to 30 teachers who were not certified in the areas in which they were teaching. A year later, the teachers' union complained that at least one person was still serving in a position for which that person was not qualified and commanding a salary well above entry-level.

Four years later, the numbers have changed in Worcester and in the state as a whole. While the state granted 2,578 waivers to uncertified teachers in the 2008-2009 school year, it has given only 491 so far this year. Worcester once had 30 teachers uncertified in the areas they were teaching; it now has 12 on waivers, one in the process of getting a license and one more in the process of getting a waiver.

And while the union was ready to fight over a single job in 2010, the lack of recent layoffs has helped take the issue off its priority list.

The district still has teachers who are only on the job because the state granted them a waiver from the usual requirements. The 14 who are on a waiver or in the process represent approximately 0.7 percent of the district's 2,012 teachers.

Of the 12 on waivers, four are in vocational fields (health assisting, engineer technology, electromechanical technology and animal science), four are in special education, three are librarians and one is a chemistry teacher.

Three of them hold active Massachusetts licenses in other fields. For instance, the engineering technology teacher is certified in secondary school math, one librarian is licensed to teach secondary school English and another librarian is certified to teach elementary school.

In addition, a moderate disabilities teacher on a waiver is licensed to teach elementary and middle school special education in New York and Rhode Island, and an electromechanical technology teacher holds inactive licenses in general science and Grades 7-12 physics and math.

Ten of them are at the starting step of the salary scale, $42,461. Another is paid $50,444, and the animal science instructor is earning $74,613.

Sheila M. Harrity, principal of Worcester Technical High School, said the instructor has almost finished her doctorate and is waiting to take an exam for certification that is only given twice a year. The school is also where the teacher on a waiver for electromechanical technology works.

“It is very hard to hire electromechanical instructors, because you're competing with salaries that business and industry is demanding. That's a high need,” Ms. Harrity said.

Special education positions are also hard to fill, according to Stacey Deboise Luster, the school department's human resources manager.

Kay C. Seale, the district's manager of special education and intervention services, said parents should know that teachers on waivers are given mentoring, support and professional development, and are accountable to department heads and others. “It would be a shared responsibility” to ensure an uncertified teacher is effective,” Ms. Seale said.

It is particularly hard to hire and retain teachers for students on the autism spectrum and those with emotional disabilities, she said, and there are increasing numbers of students with those needs.

The heads of the city's Special Education Parent Advisory Council did not return requests for comment.

Ms. Seale said she felt having four special education teachers on waivers in a district the size of Worcester was “pretty good.”

School Committee Vice Chairman Brian A. O'Connell said that overall, having 12 teachers on waivers is “not alarming.”

“But it is important to look at each individual case” and make sure teachers are progressing toward certification, he added.

To parents whose children might have a teacher on a waiver, he said, “If a child is learning well, appears to be thriving under a particular teacher ... and the student is doing well in terms of academic progress and, where appropriate, MCAS scores, parents shouldn't be worried ... A teacher can be working toward certification and be a superb teacher for a child.”

When waivers overlapped with high salaries, people were more likely to object in the past. In early 2009, for instance, the revelation that a former superintendent's assistant, Donna C. Byrnes, had been given a high-paying special education teaching job prompted the district to fire uncertified teachers and reassign others.

A year later, the teachers' union complained that at least one person was still serving in a position for which that person was not qualified and commanding a salary that was well over entry-level. The person, Doherty Memorial High School's Katerina Kambosos, now has a license for biology and for health/family and consumer science. She teaches biology and Advancement Via Individual Determination, a course that prepares middle-of-the-road students for rigorous, college preparatory courses.

The teachers union had complained about Ms. Kambosos before she was licensed. These days, the union is willing to leave it in the state's hands.

“They're the regulatory body. If they're willing to give it (a waiver) to them, then I can't really argue with it,” said Leonard A. Zalauskas, president of the union, the Educational Association of Worcester.

Contact Jacqueline Reis via email at jreis@telegram.com and follow her on Twitter @JackieReisTG.